The inclusion of disabled children in their local schools and communities is part of the universal struggle of disabled people to claim their basic human rights to equality and participation, and to insist on the necessary changes in society and its institutions to make this possible. Although this movement is still in its infancy, reports from…

Since the publication of the Salamanca statement (UNESCO 1994), inclusive schooling has formed a growing part of the deliberations of the special education community. Inclusive schooling research in Australia in the main continues to reproduce traditions of the special education field, emphasising the dominant psychological perspectives that have…

Seeking to strengthen preparation of preservice general educators for the realities of inclusive school settings, two special education teacher educators from different universities used content-based structured reflective log writing as an integral course requirement. Faced with teaching intensive course content within a limited time frame, the…

Four student interns were taught to use environmental arrangement strategies and delayed prompts to enhance the number of teaching occasions and to facilitate communicative requesting of students with severe language delays. A multiple-probe design across interns was implemented to evaluate the effects of the training on interns' use of the…

Successful inclusion of very young children with disabilities in natural environments requires professionals to have specialized skills including: collaboration with the child's parents and caregivers and other professionals, ecologically valid assessment of the child within the context of his or her natural environment, and the design of an…

Assistive Technology (AT) devices and services have been legally mandated for several years. However, the passage of the Individuals with Disabilities Act Amendments P.L. 105-17 (IDEA1997), which states that every student with an Individualized Education Program (IEP) must be considered for AT, had enormous implications impacting approximately six…

In 1980, the U.S. Congress charged the National Science Foundation (NSF) with a mission to lead development of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) for all of its citizens. Joseph Bordogna, deputy director of NSF, reaffirmed the agency's commitment to the mission when he stated that NSF needs to broaden participation in the…

A total of 274 preservice teacher education students were surveyed at the beginning and end of a one-semester unit on Human Development and Education which combined formal instruction with structured fieldwork experiences. The latter included interviewing community members regarding their knowledge of Down syndrome and opinions on inclusive…

Purpose: To evaluate the efficacy of a 6-month course of responsivity education/prelinguistic milieu teaching (RE/PMT) for children with developmental delay and RE/PMT's effects on parenting stress in a randomized clinical trial. Method: Fifty-one children, age 24-33 months, with no more than 10 expressive words or signs, were randomly assigned to…

Depression is one of the most commonly diagnosed psychiatric disorders among school-age youths. As such, school personnel should play an important role in the identification, assessment, and treatment of depression and related problems in school. School-based treatment of depression is especially relevant for students with emotional and behavioral…

We examined some conditions under which a response acquired as a tact might facilitate the establishment of a mand. We taught 3 participants with developmental disabilities to tact the items ranked highest and lowest in a preference assessment and subsequently tested to see if the responses occurred as mands. All participants manded for the highly…

Electronic technology can be used to overcome many of the barriers and other factors that restrict delivery of services to rural schools; it can also expand the world of rural gifted students who are deaf or hard of hearing. Online college and high school Web sites that offer courses are listed, as well as a Web site for tutoring and one offering…

Since passage of Public Law 94-142 in 1975, the Education for All Handicapped Children Act, much debate has occurred regarding how to address curriculum in terms of meeting needs of students within various special education categories. Recently, more discussion has emerged regarding transition and curriculum geared towards assisting with this…

In special education, professional collaboration is viewed as a powerful tool for helping teachers serve students with disabilities. An underlying assumption is that general educators will improve practice if they have opportunities to participate in collaborative professional development aimed at improving instruction for students with…

A nationwide random sample of 179 secondary general education math and special education teachers completed a survey asking them about their use of specific instructional practices to help teach math to students with learning disabilities (LD) and emotional/behavioral disorders (EB/D) and their use of specific assessment accommodations with these…